from the the-sarcasm-is-flowing dept

The online gaming company Zynga is no stranger to patent lawsuits. Like basically any high-profile internet company, it's been sued a bunch of times, usually by patent trolls who are holding broad, generic patents on obvious concepts. In 2011, Zynga was sued by a company called Segan LLC, which does not seem to exist in any real form, other than as a company set up to sue Zynga over this patent (ridiculously Bloomberg News called Segan "a rival" despite Segan having no products and no presence online whatsoever). The patent in question is US Patent 7,054,928 and it's for a "system for viewing content over a network and method therefor."

Earlier this year, the judge in the Northern District of California (note: not East Texas!) Judge Vince Chhabria tossed out the case, noting that Zynga doesn't come anywhere close to performing what's in the patent. Zynga then moved in for the kill, asking for attorneys' fees and sanctions... and Chhabria has given it to them, along with a delightfully sarcastic benchslap of Segan and its lawyers. I really suggest reading the full order from Judge Chhabria, as it's quite enjoyable reading -- but here are a few of the highlights. First, it's important to understand what the '928 patent actually covers:

In the 1990's, Marc Segan came up with an idea for how people could surf the Internet, and how companies could draw Internet users to their websites. His idea was to allow Internet users to obtain an "icon" (say, an animated image of a cowboy or a baseball player) and entice the users to travel to designated websites with their icons. So for example, a person with a cowboy icon might visit a designated website because the site offers "enhancements" to cowboy icons (such as cowboy boots, or hats, or spurs). The person might click a button on the website, or correctly
answer a trivia question posed on the website, and his cowboy icon receives an enhancement as a reward (for example, a cowboy hat appears on the animated cowboy's head). And hopefully while the person is visiting the site with his cowboy icon, he might buy an actual product – perhaps real cowboy boots, or perhaps a bottle of CowboyTM Bourbon – to make the whole endeavor worthwhile for the participating website.

He eventually gets the '928 patent that kinda sorta covers this, but when you get down to the crux of it, the patent could be summarized as follows:

In other words, Segan invented a system whereby a person who might for some reason be interested in using a character icon to browse the Internet is incented to visit particular "target websites" from which the icon could receive "enhancements" from those websites.

Okay. That's the background. The judge then gives the background of Zynga, immediately noting that: "It is not in the business of finding ways for people to explore the Internet. It is a social video game company." This does not bode well for Segan. The judge describes what Zynga does, and explains how it's nothing like what's in Segan's patent. At all. And there are little asides and jabs that make it clear he's not happy that this case ever showed up in the first place. And then he dives in to explain how Segan and its lawyers' attempt to pretend the patent applied to Zynga were so ridiculous:

This case is indeed exceptional, and Segan is indeed required to pay Zynga's fees, because the lawsuit was objectively baseless from the start. It is obvious that Claim 1 in the '928 patent describes an invention very different from the one Zynga practices in games like FarmVille. This is perhaps best illustrated by a claim construction position relating to the word "access" that Segan took throughout most of the litigation.

Among other things, Claim 1 of the '928 patent identifies a "service provider" from which the user obtains the character icon and which stores the user's information, and a "target website" that people visit to get enhancements for their characters. Claim 1 states that the target website uses a "unique identifier" on the user's device to "access" the user's record "at" the service provider, "whereby any new character enhancement offered to the user is appropriate for the user's character icon." In other words, with the invention described in the '928 patent, when someone is browsing the Internet with his cowboy icon and goes to a target website, that website accesses the user's record from the service provider so that the target website knows to offer the cowboy a pair of boots (rather than, say, a baseball glove). So for there even to be a chance of infringement, Facebook (the target web site) would need to access from Zynga (the service provider) the user record of the person playing FarmVille, so that Facebook could offer an enhancement for that person's FarmVille icon. But that doesn't happen, because that's not the way the Zynga-Facebook system works. That is so for a variety of reasons, but one of the most obvious is that Facebook does not "access" or "obtain" any user records for FarmVille players from Zynga.

To try to avoid this glaring problem, Segan proposed that when Claim 1 says that the target website accesses the user record at the service provider, what the claim really means is that the target website sends user information to the service provider. Specifically, Segan proposed that the phrase "target website uses the unique identifier on the user device to access the user's record at the service provider" should be construed as follows: "the target website communicates information associated with the user to the service provider so that subsequent activity (offering a new character enhancement) is consistent with information in the user's record and thus conducted in a way suited to that user's particular character icon . . . ."

This was one of the main pillars on which Segan's infringement suit rested – the assertion that when Facebook "communicates information . . . to the service provider," Facebook is somehow "accessing" user records from Zynga. Segan proposed this construction even though every time the verb "access" or "accessing" appears in the patent (and it appears many times), it is used in the ordinary way (i.e., "to obtain" or "gain entry to"). Segan might as well have argued that the sky is the ground. Even in the world of patent law, where lawyers and experts often take great liberties with words, this proposed construction of "access" stands out as exceptional.

Just a note: when a judge suggests you "might as well have argued that the sky is the ground," things are unlikely to end well for you. The judge then lists out a bunch of cases where attorneys' fees were awarded for egregiously bad patent lawsuits, and notes that this is "more lacking in merit" than basically all of those cases.

That might be bad enough, but it gets worse. Because after Segan tried and tried to redefine access, and after it was shown that there is no access, Segan tried another game... with another word.

But then, to get around the fact that Facebook does not actually access a user's record from Zynga (at least when "access" is used in any remotely understandable fashion), Segan came up with a different way of tackling the same problem: it proposed, for the first time, to construe the word "website" (of "target website") as "a set of related web pages, each page identified by a URL and including its underlying code and all content presented by a browser when a user visits that page." In other words, Segan's new infringement theory was that when a user plays FarmVille while on Facebook, the FarmVille game becomes part of the "target website," and therefore when Zynga is sending code and content to the user of the FarmVille game, the "target website" is actually "accessing" the code and content (even though Facebook never gets it). As the discussion in Section I illustrates, that's not what the '928 patent meant when it used the phrase "target website." But even aside from that, as the Court explained in its claim construction and summary judgment order, at least two other claim limitations were obviously not met as a matter of law.

In the end, the judge orders Segan to pay Zynga $1,188,773.93 in legal fees. Segan also tried (of course) to argue that these fees were unreasonable, but the court shuts that down, noting that, if anything, these are "on the low side for a case like this" and "given the... difficulty Segan put Zynga through."

Separately, Zynga asked for sanctions against the law firm representing Segan, Blank Rome -- and again the court agrees, though rather than making that firm jointly and severally liable for the full amount of the fee award, it just tacks on $100,000 in sanctions for the law firm. Judge Chhabria notes that the work by Blank Rome failed in how it handled claim construction and infringement theory (in a footnote it also suggests that the firm's "litigation conduct" was so bad that the Blank Rome lawyer who handled the hearing about the attorneys' fees "admitted he 'cringed' at some of the conduct of his colleagues.") And then there was this:

Segan's attorney instructing its expert not to answer – time and time again – when Zynga's counsel asked the expert about the expert's factual investigation to support his expert testimony and about the assumptions he was adopting as part of his expert opinion

But, even ignoring that, the judge finds that Blank Rome failed so badly in actually figuring out what this patent covered and whether Zynga infringed, that it deserves to be sanctioned. He doesn't think the lawyers were evil, just not very good at their jobs:

... even though the Blank Rome attorneys devised and put forth objectively baseless claim construction and infringement positions, the record suggests they did not pursue the lawsuit in bad faith or with an improper purpose. For example, several of the pre-filing communications among Blank Rome attorneys are more suggestive of lawyers who come to believe in a ridiculous argument than they are of lawyers who are preparing to file a lawsuit in bad faith.

That seems like faint praise.

Segan has indicated that it's appealing this case up to CAFC, and CAFC certainly can have some nutty rulings, but this case is so weak that it would be surprising if CAFC completely reverses things.

from the justiceville? dept

There was an earlier report in the Washington Post that one of the tech execs who met with President Obama on Tuesday had directly said that the President should issue a pardon for Ed Snowden -- something the President immediately said he could not do. There had been some speculation on which exec said that, but according to CNN, it was Mark Pincus, the founder of social gaming company Zynga:

A source familiar with the meeting told CNN Chief Washington Correspondent Jake Tapper that one of the executives, Mark Pincus, founder of Zynga, which makes on-line social games, suggested to the President that he pardon NSA leaker Edward Snowden, but Obama said he could not do that. The suggestion of the pardon was first reported by the Washington Post.

Hopefully other execs will follow on that lead and start speaking out. Given everything that's happened in the past six months, the idea that the US is still trying to arrest Snowden and charge him under the Espionage Act is a growing travesty that makes the administration look ridiculously petty. A true leader knows when to admit to making mistakes. The President has an opportunity that he's squandering.

from the trademark-with-friends dept

You may recall that Zynga was once a company that made social media games, occasionally by taking games other people had made and repackaging them. You likely also remember them for their Words With Friends app that briefly reminded everyone why they hated Scrabble. Well, things haven't been going so well for the company since its IPO, with share prices falling roughly seventy percent. And now, as we have seen in the past, the relatively aged internet company has decided to go the lawsuit route instead of competing in its own marketplace.

And thank the maker for that, because that's how I get to report to you that Zynga is suing Bang With Friends, the app that lets you bang (BANG!) your social media contacts.

The company “selected the name ‘Bang With Friends’ for its casual sex matchmaking app with Zynga’s game trademarks fully in mind,” according to the complaint. The name infringes a trademark covering games such as “Words With Friends” and “Chess With Friends,” according to the filing.

Zynga seeks a court order barring the company from using the name “Bang With Friends” in connection with any social-networking applications in the U.S. and unspecified damages.

See, while there was once a time when Zynga's games spread across everyone's Facebook pages much like a sexually transmitted disease, it's kind of hard to imagine most people thinking Zynga wanted you to bump uglies with that one girl you passed a couple times in your high school hallway. But even if you want to make the argument of brand confusion, it's somewhat ridiculous for a company that played fast and loose with intellectual property in the past to now be using it as a weapon to get monetary damages.

In the first filing, Zynga moves to have a bunch of language from EA's filings stricken as it feels that much of it is "redundant, immaterial, impertinent and/or scandalous." It feels that a lot of the information presented, such as third party disputes, games and comments that do not pertain to EA's specific claims of copyright infringement, are simply included to paint Zynga in as negative a light as possible.

Zynga also specifically rejects the idea that The Ville infringes The Sims Social by attempting to show that much of what EA claims to be infringing is either a natural part of a life sim or part of an evolution in design of other Zynga created games. This can be found in the second filing in which Zynga shows successive screen shots of its games YoVille, Cafe World and The Ville. Each with very similar UI elements.

Next, Zynga brings in a comparison of Zynga's CityVille and EA's SimCity Social games. It does so to highlight that even EA gives in to tropes and design choices common to the genre it works in. Coming off this, Zynga makes the claim that this lawsuit is nothing more than EA's response to being unable to compete in the social gaming marketplace.

Finally, we have the third filing in which Zynga makes its most bold claim yet.

Zynga claims that EA CEO John Riccitiello wanted to establish an illegal "no-hire" agreement with Zynga that would prevent the company from hiring employees away from EA. The filing says Riccitiello had grown upset that many EA employees had moved over to Zynga, and had gone "on the war path" to put an end to the talent bleed.

The company also says EA filed its lawsuit in August not because it believes Zynga copied The Sims Social, but because the company wanted to discourage its employees from jumping ship.

If Zynga's accusation is true, then EA's attempt at establishing such an agreement is serious business. These types of agreements, in which the companies agree not to hire anyone that applies, if they work for the competing company, and will often report the employee to his/her boss, are generally very bad for workers and quite possibly illegal.

These agreements are so serious that the Department of Justice had been investigating a number of tech companies, including Apple and Google, for this practice back in 2010 with evidence finally surfacing earlier this year.

Of course, EA believes this claim by Zynga is just a smokescreen.

This is a predictable subterfuge aimed at diverting attention from Zynga's persistent plagiarism of other artists and studios. Zynga would be better served trying to hold onto the shrinking number of employees they've got, rather than suing to acquire more.

Regardless of whether these claims are true or not, this shows just how far this legal dispute could go over the coming months. Here we have two powerhouse game companies fighting over something that really in the end will have no bearing on the future of the games industry.

In the end, what do we actually get out of dragging two companies' reputations through the mud? What will either company get out of winning this lawsuit? If EA wins, it will get to claim that it slayed the big bad cloning monster and Zynga will slink away and only clone the games of much smaller companies. If Zynga wins, the games industry as it is now will continue forward exactly as it had been. Either way, nothing substantial will change. So again, what's the point?

from the karma-slapped dept

Our first introduction with Zynga was back in 2009 when the maker of Mob Wars sued Zynga over its Mafia Wars game. Zynga was accused of copyright infringement and ended up paying a pretty penny. Later on in the year, Zynga turned around and sued Playdom over what it claimed was trademark infringement. Shortly there after Zynga was sued for trademark infringment over the name Mafia Wars. Then last year, Zynga decided to sue a Brazilian company, Vostu, for various claims of copyright infringment and even some claims that the company copied its entire business model. This lawsuit resulted in a very interesting ruling from a US Judge telling Zynga not to enforce its win over Vostu, because the US Judge wanted first dibs on the ruling. Remember this last case, because it is the most important one when reviewing this next lawsuit.

As outlined in our complaint, when The Ville was introduced in June 2012, the infringement of The Sims Social was unmistakable to those of us at Maxis as well as to players and the industry at large. The similarities go well beyond any superficial resemblance. Zynga’s design choices, animations, visual arrangements and character motions and actions have been directly lifted from The Sims Social. The copying was so comprehensive that the two games are, to an uninitiated observer, largely indistinguishable. Scores of media and bloggers commented on the blatant mimicry.

Compare that to Zynga's statement about its lawsuit against Vostu:

Let’s be clear – it is one thing to be inspired by Zynga games, but it is entirely different to copy all of our key product features, product strategy, branding, mission statement and employee benefits lock, stock and barrel. We welcome Vostu into the arena of social games, but blatant infringement of our creative works is not an acceptable business strategy—it is a violation of the law.

In both statements, the accuser is stating that outright copying was taking place. That each accused game was a near replica of the other game. Such a claim from EA after Zynga made very much the same claims has got to be one of the largest legal karma slaps in history. One that Zynga will be very much lucky to walk away from.

Elsewhere in the filing, EA shows that Zynga's cloning is not limited to this one case. It lists numerous instances where Zynga had been accused of cloning other popular games. It lists the afore mentioned Mafia Wars, Dream Heights, Farmville and Zynga Bingo, all games that had been publicly accused of being clones. This was done to show that Zynga has an extensive history of cloning games.

EA's filing is also full of interesting screen shot comparisons in which it points out some of the more common similarities, such as the almost exact duplication of skin tone selections and personality types. EA even provided a video showing other similarities in animations.

Something to note in these examples is that they follow a very similar pattern to the filing Zynga made in its case against Vostu. In that filing, any time Zynga wanted to show off the similarities of the two games in question, it would show images that use as many similar elements arranged in as similar a fashion as possible. Something that EA does as well. This tactic is deployed as a method to project as much of a feeling of copyright infringement as possible. Unfortunately, it also clouds the fact that much of what is shown are in all actuality user made choices.

The Ville is the newest game in our 'ville' franchise -- it builds on every major innovation from our existing invest-and-express games dating back to YoVille and continuing through CityVille and CastleVille, and introduces a number of new social features and game mechanics not seen in social games today. It's unfortunate that EA thought that this was an appropriate response to our game, and clearly demonstrates a lack of understanding of basic copyright principles. It's also ironic that EA brings this suit shortly after launching SimCity Social, which bears an uncanny resemblance to Zynga's CityVille game. Nonetheless, we plan to defend our rights to the fullest extent possible and intend to win with players.

Zynga has been accused of copying so many games that they’ve sadly lost the ability to recognize games like ours that are chock full of original content and have been independently created. Vostu has 500 brilliant employees working night and day making hand drawings and writing proprietary code for online games that our 35 million users worldwide enjoy. Zynga’s anti-competitive effort to bully us with a frivolous lawsuit — especially when we have some of the same key investors — is pathetic. While Zynga plays games with the legal process we will continue focusing on using our substantial resources to create games that entertain our customers.

There are two key similarities between these two defensive statements. The first is that both companies make the claim that their work is original and built with the companies' creative talents. The other is both are claiming that the lawsuits are less about copyright and more about attacking a competitor. It really boggles the mind that a company like Zynga has missed the poetics of this situation.

While we have repeatedly stated that the practice of game cloning is something that can be dealt with outside of the legal system, it is interesting to see these two players go toe to toe. What makes this case even more interesting than a typical cloning case, as I have tried to portray, is that Zynga set itself up for this lawsuit. Not just by copying EA's game, but also by providing the exact kind of legal precedent EA needs to win. If Zynga is to defend itself in this case, it is in effect defending Vostu's actions. Something that Zynga probably isn't looking forward to.

from the progressive-solutions dept

We recently covered the indy developer Nimblebit and their friendly-but-snarky response to Zynga copying the mechanics of one of their games. As I argued in the comments to that post, I think people sometimes fail to recognize that copiers do add something of their own—at least, the successful copiers do. Nevertheless, there is a lot of copying in the game industry, and it can lead to a great deal of ire in the community. As Nimblebit demonstrated, there are ways to approach the problem that don't involve immediately going legal.

It's nice to see more developers acknowledging this. At the Game Developers Conference, Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijam of Vlambeer said they are getting tired of the same old debates about copying, and want to move the discussion forward. Their suggestion is to worry less about patents and ownership rights, and more about the actual impact of copying—and then address it by being more open, not less:

The pair acknowledged that protecting game designs with patents might actually damage innovation, but argued that this sort of legal protection is separate from the issue of whether game cloning is helpful or harmful to the industry. And make no mistake, clones are hurting the industry, Nijam said, both by diverting skilled developers towards work on soulless copies and demotivating skilled developers who put a lot of effort into truly original games.

What's worse, a preponderance of low-quality clones is training consumers to expect a lack of originality in the industry, Nijam said, a loss of "gaming literacy" that drags the whole industry down. "Players will get all those bad games and stop recognizing actual good games," he said. "If you only eat bad hamburgers, you're not going to recognize a good hamburger."

The natural reaction to this kind of rampant cloning among many developers might be to hold their cards close to the vest, keeping a new idea totally secret until dropping it on an unsuspecting public. But Ismail said the solution to the cloning problem is actually the opposite—educating gamers by developing games out in the open and showing them the real work that goes into an original design. Detailed development blogs, documentaries like Indie Game: The Movie, and websites that dig deep into game design process all help improve gaming literacy among the public and build a foundation for an audience that values original games.

I can only hope other developers at the conference heed his call. The simple fact in any creative industry is that if someone can beat you by copying your work wholesale, then either they are doing something you're not, or you are failing to connect with your audience. Perhaps, as Ismail argues, this can even become a broader cultural problem that needs to be addressed by the industry as a whole—and that's a good challenge to take on. After all, what's more productive? A bunch of developers suing each other without always distinguishing between genuine bad-actors and actual innovative copying? Or a bunch of developers working together to enhance the industry as a whole, better connecting with fans and letting originality emerge organically? The answer, I hope, is easy.

from the some-build-bridges,-some-live-under-them dept

Another day, another patent troll. Ars Technica reports that a shell company called Gametek LLC is suing a bunch of social gaming giants, including Facebook and Zynga. The patent? Patent #7,076,445: "A system and methods allowing the creation, integration, and transaction of advantages," later clarified (somewhat) as giving the user "access to and purchase offered advantages and interact with interactive advertisements to purchase products and or services." In other words, in-game purchases. The one and only point in the patent's favor is its early registration date:

"It looks like the patent was filed June 20, 2000, and at that time, I'm not sure this isn't a novel idea," Dallas attorney and Law of the Game blog author Mark Methenitis tells Ars Technica. The early filing means the patent "predates Facebook and most all of the social games as we know them," Methenitis notes, though older gaming services like AOL and Yahoo Games may have been using similar techniques before that.

Even if there is no prior art, this just demonstrates the problem with software patents. Software innovation moves fast, and the majority of "novel" inventions are still pretty obvious and inevitable, usually being developed by multiple people at once. More importantly, they don't require any actual implementation, just laughably vague descriptions of a concept like the ones above. That allows companies like this to buy a patent, sit on it, do nothing, and attempt to place a private tax on the actual innovators:

But the lawsuit doesn't seem to comes from a company that actually makes such games. The patent in question was granted in 2006 as the sole protected invention for one Shawn Cartwright. It was then transferred to little-known "revenue transaction software" company Theados Corp. last year, before being reassigned to plaintiff Gametek earlier this month.

The Gametek LLC that filed the lawsuit is based in Newport Beach, Ca., but shares a name with a Florida-based, early-'90s game developer best known for game show adaptations which closed its doors in 1998. The shell company doesn't seem to have any legitimate products in social gaming or any other field, and may have been created specifically to argue this case.

When companies are able to hold back real progress while contributing zilch, it's just more evidence that the patent system is broken.

from the nicely-done dept

It's no secret at all that casual gaming giant Zynga has a dreadful reputation for copying the games of others, and then crushing them in the marketplace. What's even more ridiculous is that Zynga also has a habit of using IP laws to go after competitors. There's been a lot of news this week over the story that Zynga's new tower sim game Dream Heightsappears to copy another game, Tiny Tower from Nimblebit, a small, 3-person development shop. As with any "big company copies little company" story, this story blew up fast and is getting a ton of attention. But what struck me most about it was how Nimblebit handled itself. Rather than threaten or sue or flip out... it put out a (slightly sarcastic, yes) "Dear Zynga" image that congratulated the company, wishing them luck, and saying that they were "looking forward to inspiring you with our future games."

It's a perfect response in so many ways. First, rather than resorting to a costly and pointless legal process, it makes the point pretty damn clearly -- juxtaposing screenshots from the two games. Second, by taking a cheeky approach to it, it makes Nimblebit look even better, and Zynga more obnoxious. I would imagine that this controversy ends up helping Nimblebit quite a bit.

It also demonstrates, yet again, that there are social costs to straight up copying. Even if it's legal (and it might be -- and it should be mentioned that there have been other sim tower games as well... ) there's a social stigma against such blatant copying. And it seems that by going public Nimblebit ends up accomplishing a lot more. It gets a lot more attention to its own game without wasting money on a costly and long legal process... plus it shames Zynga, but still leaves the actual competition open to the market place.

from the let's-work-this-out dept

There were a bunch of reports last week about a so-called "scandal" at social gaming company Zynga, concerning reports that it demanded stock options back from employees or they would be fired. Zynga certainly has done some questionable things over the years, and hasn't always had the greatest reputation... so a lot of people jumped on this story, and plenty of people submitted it. But, the details suggest that the only real "scandal" here is in the attempts by reporters to make this into a scandal (kudos to Dan Primack for not getting fooled). The reporters doing so either don't understand what really happened or are just attacking Zynga for the hell of it. I've got no problem calling out Zynga when I think the company has done something bad, but the details here suggest that what Zynga did is actually pretty reasonable.

The part that gets lost in most of the discussions is the fact that Zynga was only asking about unvested stock options, rather than vested ones. Unvested stock options are just like future salary. You can lose it if you get fired. What Zynga did here was take a few employees that it felt weren't achieving up to expectations and, rather just fire them -- in which case they would have received none of their unvested options -- try to find another role for them in the company. That other role, however, would be somewhat lower on the totem pole, and thus, would be entitled to fewer stock options. Yes, it's basically a demotion, but for some people perhaps that's preferable to an outright firing.

But here's the key point. Most of the "Zynga bad!" reporting on this made it sound as though Zynga was taking back options that had already vested. That's false and misleading. Nothing was taken back from the employees. The already vested options remained untouched. Basically Zynga was offering a way for people, who otherwise would have been fired, to keep accumulating some options, just at a lower rate. That may be insulting, but it seems like a more reasonable and humane solution than just firing them outright.

from the good-for-them dept

While Google has been pretty vocal about its complaints concerning PROTECT IP and SOPA, and Yahoo, LinkedIn and Zynga have expressed concerns elsewhere, the silence of large companies like Facebook, Twitter, eBay, Mozilla and AOL had been unfortunate. That appears to be changing. As a group, they have now all sent a letter to the key sponsors of both bills, arguing that the approach here is the exact wrong approach, and will do significant damage to the parts of the economy that are innovating and creating jobs today:

We are very concerned that the bills as written would seriously undermine the effective mechanism Congress enacted in the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) to provide a safe harbor for Internet companies that act in good faith to remove infringing content from their sites. Since their enactment in 1998, the DMCA's safe harbor provisions for online service providers have been a cornerstone of the U.S. Internet and technology industry's growth and success. While we work together to find additional ways to target foreign "rogue" sites, we should not jeopardize a foundational structure that has worked for content owners and Internet companies alike and provides certainty to innovators with new ideas for how people create, find, discuss, and share information lawfully online.

We are proud to be a part of an industry that has been crucial to U.S. economic growth and job creation. A recent McKinsey Global Institute report found that the Internet accounts for 3.4% of GDP in the 13 countries that McKinsey studied, and, in the U.S., the Internet's contribution to GDP is even larger. If Internet consumption and expenditure were a sector, its contribution to GDP would be greater than energy, agriculture, communication, mining, or utilities. In addition, the Internet industry has increased productivity for small and medium-sized businesses by 10%. We urge you not to risk either this success or the tremendous benefits the Internet has brought to hundreds of millions of Americans and people around the world.

Can't wait to see the usual commenters stop by to insist that basically every big company on the internet is only saying this because they're dedicated to infringement. But the real question is: at what point does Congress realize that there's real opposition to this bill from one of the few industries out there that's actually doing well these days?